


Flowers Can Grow Between the Cracks in the Sidewalk

by turnonmyheels



Category: The Fast and the Furious
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-30
Updated: 2010-11-30
Packaged: 2017-10-13 11:16:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/136766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turnonmyheels/pseuds/turnonmyheels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Letty moves in with Mia after she gets out of prison</p><p>Notes: 2007 Yuletide fic</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flowers Can Grow Between the Cracks in the Sidewalk

Mia tapped out the bass line of Shakira's latest song against the steering wheel of her VW Bug. She checked the clock for the third time in the same minute and sighed. There were a million and five places she'd rather be than outside the Central California Women's Facility. At home napping, in the library finding another source for her Organic Chem paper, doing laundry, buying groceries, picking up a shift at the bar -- instead she was in Chowchilla picking up the pieces of Dom's life.

Again.

There was nothing on the radio, her iPod battery was on the fritz, and Letty was five minutes late. Mia opened the sunroof, rolled up the windows, and locked the doors, determined to cross off at least one item on her to-do list and take a nap.

~*~

 

Mia jerked awake at the knock on her window. "I'm up, I'm up." She grunted and fumbled for the lever on the seat to sit up. Once she was locked and in the upright position her disorientation faded. "Letty." Mia got out of the car and went for a hug but Letty side-stepped her and walked around the car.

"This your ride?" Letty's voice was lower than Mia remembered. Rougher too, like she'd spent the past four years smoking all the cigarettes she could get her hands on.

Mia felt her face flush and couldn't help but be embarrassed. Fortunately, embarrassment only made her more defensive than she usually was. She pushed the button on the key to pop the trunk and glared at Letty. "You got a problem with it?"

Letty's lip curled and Mia fought back a smile at the familiar expression; Letty's lip curled more than Elvis's. "Don't seem like your style."

The gecko green Bug was a far cry from the tricked-out, turquoise Integra she used to have but nothing about Mia's life was the same as it was back then. "Styles change, Letty." Mia reached for the brown paper bag holding all Letty's possessions to put it in the trunk, but Letty side-stepped her again. Mia rolled her eyes and got in the car. "You wanna stay here all day or you wanna go home?"

Letty tossed the bag in the trunk. "You know I ain't got nowhere to go." She slammed the trunk harder than she should have, and Mia winced when the car bounced.

Mia swallowed down the words she'd been holding back for years whenever Leon or Letty sent her a letter or called her bitching about their fate. She'd said them once, to Dom when he ran from Mexico to Japan and told herself she'd never say them again.

_"Jesse and Vince are dead. The rest of you got what you deserve. And I'm the one paying for your ass Dom. Just...just go away and stay away."_

Instead she said, "Shut up and get in the car." Letty slammed the door and glared out the window while Mia put her seat belt on and cranked the car. "Put on your seat belt."

Letty put on her seat belt.

"Do you want to stop somewhere before we get back?" Mia pulled out of the parking lot and headed toward home. Letty shrugged a shoulder and stared out the window. "You hungry?" Mia stopped at the light and looked over at Letty, really looked at her. Her hair was limp and dead looking, nails bitten down to the quick. She'd lost a lot of weight, nothing but bone and muscle left behind. Lots of muscle, Mia bet Letty'd spent all her time lifting weights. Even so, she was still one of the sexiest women Mia had ever seen. "Thirsty?" Letty chewed on her index finger. "Need to pee?"

Silence filled the car and Mia gritted her teeth and turned up the radio. It was an old Eminem song but Letty'd been behind bars so long Mia figured she hadn't heard it yet. Letty hated rap and Mia knew it. She turned the radio up louder and pushed the pedal down when the light changed. The Bug wasn't slammed down and tricked out with several thousand dollars beneath the hood, but it got her where she wanted to go as fast as she needed to get there.

"Look, it's a four-hour ride and the silent treatment gets old fast."

"Thought you wanted me to shut up."

Mia took a deep breath and counted to ten. It didn't help so she took several deep breaths and counted to a hundred. "You know what? I don't need your attitude or your shit. I'm doing you a favor here so quit being a bitch."

"Whatever," Letty mumbled, pulling her feet up on the seat then wrapping her arms around her knees.

Mia pulled onto the highway singing along with the radio under her breath. She wasn't going to let Letty get under her skin. She was going to take her home, share her house with her until she got back on her feet, and then that would be that. Letty'd move out as soon as she could and Mia's life would get back to normal. School, work, homework, making ends meet, always looking to the future. No family, nothing from the past to remind her she had ever had a family.

Mia's stomach rumbled and she turned to ask Letty what she wanted to eat, but Letty was sound asleep. Head leaning against the window, arms still tightly wrapped around her knees, she looked young and innocent -- Mia didn't want to disturb her. She reached behind the seat and fumbled for the granola bar in her purse, it would hold her over until they got home.

~*~

 

Letty jerked awake when the car shut off. The sudden silence made her think she was locked away in solitary. Then the overhead light came on and she looked over to see Mia Toretto getting out of the car. "Come on, Letty. There's some lasagna in the fridge, I'll heat it up while you shower."

And just like that, Letty was back in the house she used to live in and nothing was the same. Mia parked her cutesy Bug -- was that a flower vase in the fucking dash? -- in the garage where the Charger used to have point of pride. She'd spent most of her life hanging out in this garage or the other one. Tinkering with the Charger, fucking Dom in or on it and every other car they had worked on, drinking beers and hanging out with the guys. A chill crept up Letty's spine, they were all things she'd never do again. She grabbed her bag out of the trunk, gently closed it, and followed Mia to the house.

"Your clothes are still upstairs, towels and stuff where they always were. Use anything of mine you want," Mia said over her shoulder and disappeared into the kitchen. The familiar sound of pots and pans rattling immediately followed. Still the same old furniture, same curtains and rugs. New pictures were on the walls and Letty knew she'd look at them later to try to fill in the blanks, but right now the only thing on her mind was the shower. The room she'd shared with Dom looked just like it did before Race Wars. She opened a dresser drawer and there were her panties and bras. The drawer below filled with her jeans. She grabbed what she needed and headed to the bathroom finding a new shower curtain and rug but the rest was the same.

Letty didn't lock the door when she closed it, she doubted she'd ever willingly lock a door again. She turned the water on and stripped down while she waited for it to heat, then stepped inside the shower and turned the water as hot as she could stand it. With closed eyes she stood under the spray and breathed in the steam. No one was going to interrupt her shower. She could take all the time she wanted. She could wash and condition, shave and exfoliate, all those things she hadn't been able to do the past four years. She couldn't help but smile a bit as she opened Mia's shampoo and breathed in the fruity scent. Mia always had stuff that smelled like flowers, fruits, and perfumes. Letty had always bypassed it before, using Dom's stuff 'cause it got the grease and the oil off better. There was nothing in this shower a man would use and Letty hadn't had engine oil under her nails in years.

They hadn't spoken about Dom at all since Letty'd been picked up, too much risk of being overheard and Mia being charged with aiding and abetting, but now that they were home Letty could find out where he was. She ignored the gnawing in the pit of her stomach that said she might not _want_ to know where he was. Or how he was. Or who he was screwing. She rinsed the conditioner out of her hair and refused to think about Dom and that fucking Brian and those looks neither of them had bothered to hide.

She stepped out of the shower half an hour later feeling like a brand new woman. She dried off and dug through Mia's lotions and moisturizers and hair products until she found what she wanted. She smoothed on the lotion slowly, reveling in the feel of perfectly shaved skin -- she felt a hundred percent better already. She pulled on her favorite pair of jeans and couldn't help but be disappointed when they sagged in places they used to be snug. She looked more like a teenage boy than a woman, except for her tits, they looked bigger now than they used to without her hips and ass balancing them out. She snorted at her reflection and started to go downstairs when something black and gleaming caught her eye. Mia was a helluva good cook and Letty hadn't had anything but prison food for four years.

But first, she was gonna blow-dry her hair.

~*~

 

"Looks good," Letty said and chose a seat that would put her back to the wall. The same seat Dom had always used when he first came back from prison. "Smells even better."

Mia poured a glass of wine for each of them and sat down across from Letty. They filled their plates with lasagna, salad, and bread and spent a few minutes eating in silence. "Tastes great, Mia. You always were a good cook."

Sipping her wine, Mia looked up at Letty and smiled. "Thanks. It's mom's recipe."

More dead. Everyone was dead or gone now except for Mia and Letty. Leon still had a few years behind bars. "Now, that we're here, you can tell me -- where's Dominic?"

"Last I heard, he was in Japan." Mia toyed with her food, moving it around on the plate. "He's not coming back."

Those four little words brought Letty's world to a standstill. There was no way she could even think about getting somewhere like Japan for two, three years. If then. The government may not let her have a passport and you can't get somewhere like Japan without a passport.

"I've gotta find a job." She sipped the wine and dragged a piece of bread through the red sauce on her plate. "You still got the garage and the market?"

"I sold them. I needed the money to pay off the mortgage on the house. And for tuition." Mia's eyes flashed and her chin jutted out. She looked ready to fight.

"What about my tools?" Letty cut herself another piece of lasagna and tried to remain calm. If her tools were gone she was fucked.

"Hector bought the garage from me, he knew you and Leon would want your stuff back. I don't know what he did with them, but he said he'd give them back when you got out."

Letty nodded and cleaned her plate before pouring another glass of wine.

"I don't know how he's doing, but he might give you a job."

Working on cars was all Letty'd ever known. So long as Hector gave her her shit back, she'd be able to find a job in no time. Hector might give her a job, and Letty'd be glad to take it, but she wasn't sure she could stand working in Dom's garage knowing she'd never see him again. There was that gnawing again. She should listen to her gut. It had told her not to do that last job and look where ignoring it had gotten her.

"Which cemetery?"

Mia stood abruptly and started clearing the table. "The state buried Jesse in a pauper's grave and Vince was buried at the Catholic Church over on Hill St."

Letty gathered the remaining dishes and followed Mia to the kitchen. She scraped all the plates and Mia loaded the dishwasher and put away the food. "I've got a paper to work on so I'm headed to the library." There was an apology in Mia's voice Letty didn't want to hear.

"Go ahead, I think I'll turn in early."

The house was too quiet. She was used to the sounds and smells of hundreds of women and clanging doors and locks and the constant hum of fluorescent lights. Letty turned on the radio on the nightstand and stripped off her clothes. She crawled between the sheets and inhaled deeply trying to catch Dom's scent but it was no good. Too many years, and Mia was too good of a housekeeper. She didn't fall asleep until hours after Mia returned.

~*~

 

Letty was jumpy. And skittish. Words that Mia would never have used to describe her before, but the fact remained that she was. It reminded her of Dom. Everything about Letty reminded her of Dom and it was driving her out of her mind. She watched Letty slide back in to the rhythm of garage, bar, garage, home just like she had never left. She was driving a fixer-upper, already slammed down, and was pouring money into the engine.

Mia got a little angrier every day when Letty pulled into the driveway and the engine sounded better than it did before she'd left. Either Letty was racing, Hector was paying her too much, or Letty had cash stashed somewhere from all those truck jobs they pulled. Or something else Mia refused to think about further. Letty was a grown woman and if she wanted to make the same mistakes all over again ... she was better than that, but Mia had no idea how to make Letty see that for herself.

Letty and her new ride pulled into the drive and Mia clenched her hands. The car gleamed with its new paint job and graphics -- beautiful, wild and flashy, and in your face, just like Letty. Letty got out of the car, walked around to the back and popped the trunk pulling out about half a dozen bags filled with clothes. She walked toward the house, pelvis thrust forward, hips swaying side to side. She'd put a little weight on in the past couple months, and her ass was rounding out again -- Mia appreciated every pound and cooked Letty's favorites as often as she could.

Letty's wife beater was smudged with grease right above her belly button and on her boob, Mia's fingers itched to trace the smudges across the cotton, down onto her skin. She was never going to have the opportunity to do that, so she was going to kick Letty's ass until she straightened up.

Letty didn't walk inside, she strutted, sneer permanently etched on her face. She dropped her bags on the couch and shouted, "Yo, Mia! I'm home."

"I've got eyes Letty. And ears."

Mia gritted her teeth as Letty dropped a new pair of Oakley's on the counter and dug around in the fridge coming out with a beer. "Damn Mia, what's your problem? You on the rag?" Letty turned up the beer and drank half of it.

Mia reached out, snatched it out of her hands, and threw it in the trash.

"What the fuck?"

"I'm not on the rag, Letty. I'm pissed off and worried. Where are you getting the money for all this stuff? Tricked out rides? Bags filled with clothes? Fucking $300 sunglasses?" Letty couldn't look innocent if she tried, but she was doing a damn good impersonation of shock. "You think I don't know what this stuff costs? You think I'm gonna stand here and watch you ruin your life all over again?"

Everything she'd been holding back for months came bubbling up and Mia didn't even try to stop it. "Do you have any idea what it's like for me? You always left me out of _everything_. It was always all" -- Mia dropped her voice and tried to imitate Dom's deep bass -- "Oh don't worry about Mia, she'll cook and she'll clean, and she'll stay home and be a good little girl but she can't race with us, or hang with us. We can't tell her anything that's going on because she's just a kid." Mia's voice rose back to its normal tone. "Meanwhile, you go and break a dozen laws and nearly get yourself killed, succeed in killing Vince and Jesse, and you expect me just to stand by and watch you fuck it all up again?"

Mia had to stop and catch her breath. "Damn it, Letty. Can't you see you're all I've got left?"

Letty opened the fridge and pulled out two beers, she handed one to Mia and drank hers down. "I can see you're freaked out and I even get why. Guess it's too much to ask you to trust a con after how you got burned by one before." Letty tossed her empty bottle in the trash, walked up to Mia, and put her hands on her shoulders. "I'll get my shit and be gone by tomorrow."

"Letty, no -- that's not what I meant," Mia grabbed onto Letty's arms and squeezed.

"It's what I heard." Letty pulled away and ran up the stairs. Mia jumped when the bedroom door slammed.

"Damn it." Mia put the beer down and ran after Letty.

~*~

 

Fucking Dom. Fucking Dom and his fucked up mistakes, ruining his life and hers, making Mia paranoid as hell. Letty grabbed the duffle bag from under the bed and started emptying drawers into it. Her hands shook when she tried to zip the bag closed. Better that they shook than curling into fists and punching Mia in her pretty, paranoid face. The bedroom door swung open and slammed against the wall.

"I didn't tell you that you had to leave." Mia had her hands on her hips, chest heaving probably from running up the stairs, face flushed pink.

Letty pulled the zipper the last inch and swung the bag over her shoulder. "Good as." There was no way she could get out the door without touching Mia, and if she touched her now, it was gonna be bad. Life changing bad. Fuck or fight, fight or fuck -- it was how Letty'd lived her entire life. No matter how pretty Mia was, there was no way she could fuck her ex's sister, which left fighting, and Letty wouldn't punch the woman who'd taken her in and shared her home. "Get out of the way."

"Tell me where you got these things. Jesus, Letty." Mia crossed her arms over her chest and lifted her chin. "We just need to talk! I'm worried about you and want to know what's going on."

Letty tried to walk around Mia but she kept herself between Letty and the door. "Yeah? Well I don't talk to people who don't trust me."

"Could you be more childish?" Mia reached for the bag, but Letty dodged her hand and tried to slip around her again. Mia stuck out her leg at the last second and tripped her. Letty fell forward, dropping the bag so she could catch herself before she face-planted on the floor. Too many fights in the neighborhood growing up, too many fights in prison, Letty acted on instinct. She reached out and grabbed Mia behind the knee knocking her down. Letty rolled toward Mia, swung a leg over her and straddled her hips, holding her down by her shoulders. This whole situation was fucked and Letty was going to stand up, pick up her bag, and walk out the door except she hadn't counted on Mia. She must have forgotten that this was Dom's little sister and she grew up rough-housing him and the guys.

Mia punched her in the gut, grabbed a handful of her hair, and rolled them over so that Mia was on top. Mia sat on her ribs, knees digging into Letty's shoulders with a handful of hair wrapped around one fist. Her face was flushed, eyes bright and sparkling. "Don't make me kick your ass, Letty. Tell me where the money's coming from."

Letty stared at Mia's heaving chest and thought about turning this into a real fight. Mia wriggled a little and loosened her grip on Letty's hair, and leaned in closer. "Tell me."

Letty rolled her eyes and ground out. "I had a stash of money in the garage. Hector never found it."

Mia twirled a strand of Letty's hair around her finger. "And you can't do anything with it because of your parole so you're blowing it as fast as you can." Mia shook her head and leaned in even closer. "Don't you ever learn?"

Letty met her eyes and tried to read her expression but it was no good, she never had learned to read what was going on below the surface with Mia.

"Stop spending that money. You've got to live like it isn't there. They won't ever stop watching you Letty, and that new car you're driving is a beacon for trouble. You've got to let that old life go." Mia leaned in even closer and Letty could smell the beer on her breath. "Make a new life, make new mistakes."

Letty searched Mia's face but there was no answer; there wasn't an answer in her gut -- it was thankfully quiet for a change. She had nothing to go on but Mia wriggling a little and leaning in even closer, so Letty closed the gap between them, brought her mouth to Mia's and brushed their lips together. Mia's lips parted and Letty slid her tongue inside just a second before pulling back to gauge Mia's reaction. She looked like she wanted more. Letty wrapped both arms around Mia and rolled them over, pinning Mia's wrists on either side of her head. "You did say make new mistakes."

"I did." Mia giggled a little and rocked up against Letty. "I didn't think you'd start making them so soon. I was afraid I was going to have to buy you flowers or something."

"Nah. Flowers aren't my style."

~*~

 

Mia locked the door behind her and checked the time on her cell phone. She was running late. She dashed to her car and threw her bag in the passenger seat. It wasn't until she had backed down the driveway that she saw the daisies in the flower vase of the car. She ran a finger along the petals and smiled. She hit speed dial 1 on her phone and pulled out onto the road. "I thought flowers weren't your style."


End file.
